


Blue

by greenglowsgold



Category: The Paradise
Genre: 1x07 related, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-13
Updated: 2013-11-13
Packaged: 2018-01-01 06:37:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1041544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenglowsgold/pseuds/greenglowsgold
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You should wear green more often,” he said, and the next day, she wore blue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blue

“You should wear green more often,” he said, and the next day, she wore blue.

His eyes caught onto her from across the street and couldn’t look away. He must have been wrong, before, because he couldn’t imagine a shade that could suit her better than this. It caught the glint of her eyes in the sun, shined a reflection of the gold in her hair. Her hands flitted across the folds, refusing to stay still for more than a moment at a time.

“Anything,” Katherine said, and within the minute, he chose blue.

Not the classic fabrics that had been laid out, of course not. Not the bright shocks of red or orange, either, puffed out and proud, the colors of swollen hearts. Not green.

Not the same shade of blue as her eyes, either, but darker, with a touch of mourning. ‘Midnight Ink,’ he was informed. He pulled it free and smiled. Blue was a color for important things. It had meaning, he was sure, which likely varied depending on whether it was applied to flowers or furniture or fabric. Midday sun or deep sadness, or something else he wasn’t aware of.

He’d never had much of an eye for color.

His mind worked at business, and left the finer points of style to those who knew better what it meant. Still, he poured over a swath of Midnight Ink fabric at night in his office, wondering whether a close enough look would reveal why he’d chosen it. Perhaps if he held it in the right light, or ran his fingers across the edges, or stood in the place where he’d kissed her. At an hour later and darker than the silk, he gave it up for a loss, figuring there were things he would never understand. After all, he was a man who knew business.

But so was Denise, he’d almost forgotten. It seemed a little unfair, for one person to have both sales and color so clearly in their head, but he only smiled at the yards of Midnight Ink draped over her stalls, even as Katherine’s fingers clutched wrinkles into her dress. Denise had taken the matter out of his hands, before he could drive himself mad trying to find meaning in the fabric, and reclaimed the color blue, all shades. He didn’t go over to tell her that, didn’t ask her what she saw in the silk, because if he had to ask, he didn’t think it was his to know.

Katherine came to him later: white, always white. Wedding-soft if not for the bright embellishments that followed her everywhere. A bride with no containment. She asked him to love her for it. Part of him wanted to.

When he saw Denise again, it was on an emptier street, righting a fallen model so as not to ruin the dress — blue — with the dirt trampled into the stone. She wanted something much simpler, though he felt certain that blue wasn’t the color of friendship. Loss, maybe. A shimmer he couldn’t call hopeful swimming in her eyes. He didn’t ask what she saw in his own.

If she came back to him, she wouldn’t be wearing blue. He wondered if it was selfish, if it was wrong, to wish for her without color.


End file.
